MILITARY TACTICS OF ANIMALS 



THE training of dogs to act as messengers and 

 sentries in war reminds us that many animals are 

 themselves in the habit of using methods and means 

 to secure their own safety against surprise, or the 

 success of attacks on the lives or property of others, 

 which in some cases exhibit a high degree of military 

 training and organisation. 



Regular sentries, duly relieved at intervals, are 

 employed by so many of the gregarious quadrupeds 

 and larger birds, that their use seems to be rather 

 the rule than the exception. Chamois, wild sheep, 

 ibex, and other mountain antelopes, as well as the 

 guanacos of South America, always post a sentinel. 

 So do seals when sleeping on the rocks ; and the 

 peccaries, the small wild pigs of South America, 

 which are fond of lying in the hollow trunks of 

 fallen trees, are said to leave a guard at the 

 entrance, whose place, if he be shot, is occupied 

 almost mechanically by the next in order within the 



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